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OpenAI recently announced that it would be launching a new five-week programme called Converge, backed by the OpenAI Startup Fund. The new cohort looks to focus on backing founders building AI-powered startups. The selected participants will receive $1 million in equity investment, and early access to OpenAI models, including GPT-3, DALL.E 2, etc, alongside programming tailored to AI companies.
The registrations are open till November 25. Developers and entrepreneurs looking to build transformational products with AI can apply their ideas here.
OpenAI said that the participants are expected to be from diverse backgrounds, including exceptional engineers, designers, researchers, and product builders, who will benefit from the programme through workshops, office hours, and events with practitioners from the OpenAI team and beyond.
The first cohort will consist of approximately ten founding teams, with no limitations on which seed stage they’re in—the participants may range from pre-idea solo founders to co-founding teams already working on a product.
Read: OpenAI Launches 100 Mn Fund to Catch AI Startups Young
Last year, OpenAI announced a $100 million startup fund in partnership with Microsoft and other partners to invest in startups that use artificial intelligence. At the time, OpenAI chief, and former president of Y-Combinator, Sam Altman, had said that it was not a typical corporate venture fund.
But, what’s in it for OpenAI? Besides backing the companies with financial and technical support, the company looks to get equity in these startups, alongside the IP rights for the use cases and products developed on its systems.
OpenAI Startup Fund looks to back startups in the impact sectors, including healthcare, climate change, education, etc. Additionally, it is looking to invest in companies working in niche areas, driving big leaps in productivity, like personal assistants, and semantic search. Alman believes helping people get more productive with new tools is a big deal. “We can imagine brand new interfaces that weren’t possible a year ago,” he added.
Further, he said that the company is open to new ideas across sectors. However, healthcare, education, climate and energy, professional services (financial, real estate, legal, etc), search, virtual assistants, and new interfaces will remain their top priority.
